Nutraceuticals for Management of Metabolic Disorders

1.1 Nutraceuticals

Dr. Stephen Defelice introduced the term “Nutraceutical” in 1989, which was derived from words “Nutrition” (food) and “Pharmaceutical” (drug) (Brower, 1998). According to Defelice, nautraceuticals are the foods or part of it that have health-promoting benefits or medicinal properties in preventing or treatment of metabolic disorders (Trottier et al., 2010). Father of medicine “Hippocrates” said, “let food be your medicine” the ideology behind this was to mainly focus on prevention rather than treatment of diseases. Usually, nutraceuticals are also referred to as multifunctional foods, functional food and dietary supplements, etc. Functional foods are the food that claim to have health-giving additives either by incorporating new ingredients or from existing ingredients. It can be defined as foods that usually have a positive impact on an individual’s health besides providing basic necessary nutritional requirements. These foods are also known as FOSHU (Foods for specific health uses) (Kalra, 2003).

1.2 Nutraceutical Principle

Figure 1.

Basic theory of nutraceuticals

Dietary supplement, health and education act (DSHEA, 1994) defined dietary supplements are the dietary products which are specifically designed to supplement the diet. It usually contains one of the following dietary ingredients such as herb, mineral, vitamin, amino acid or botanical either in extracted or concentrated form, which is consumed in liquid, tablet or pill form (Zeisel, 1999). It is generally labelled as “dietary supplements” (FDA/CFSAN, 1994), it cannot be consumed as a sole meal or conventional food. As per DSHEA Act 1994, the firms are whole sole liable for ensuring the legal safety requirements of their dietary supplements before marketing to safeguard that they meet up all specifications of DSHEA (Unites state Pharmacopeia USP, 2006).

In simple words, Nutraceuticals can be defined as a “food substance that has both nutritive as well pharmaceutical properties that help to promote health benefits by preventing metabolic disorders” whereas, functional foods are described as “food products that are consumed as a part of a routine diet to attain health benefits in addition to basic nutritional properties”.

1.3 Nutraceuticals Benefits

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  No side effect

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  Increase healthful effects

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  Usually have natural dietary supplements

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  Amend medical condition by improving health values

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  Readily available at nominal price

Figure 2.

Benefits of Nutraceuticals

Many researchers linked the relationship between consumption of healthful food and prevention of multiple degenerative diseases.

Nutritional therapy is a remedial process that utilizes nutraceutical or dietary products to improve human health. This concept is based on facts that foods not only just provide energy and nutrients but it could also promote health benefits.

As per nutritional therapy and nutraceutical theory, the target goal of preventing degenerative diseases is achieved by using the efficacy of nutraceuticals and dietary products in building up healthy digestion, detoxify the body, preventing deficiencies of vitamins and minerals. Phytonutrients are essential plant chemicals or nutrients that have selective biological properties in promoting health benefits (Zhao, 2007).